Lost without you
by Anironcuil
Summary: Unrelated Vaan/Penelo oneshots based on titles from my Ipod play list. Random fluff essentially. Penelo POV...so far anyways.
1. Chapter 1

**It Ends Tonight**

I hadn't thought much about it until that night. But there in the darkness, shivering against the cold, wondering what would happen that next morning…well, it suddenly meant more to me than I had ever thought.

He's always been more to me than just a friend; a brother perhaps…but even more in these past few years. Brothers don't make your stomach do weird twisty things every time you see them, or make your palms sweat when they are near you. Just the same, it's not something I ever gave a great deal of intense thought to. That's just how I feel around Vaan.

But that night, sitting on watch with a pathetically thin blanket wrapped around my shoulders staring as hard as I could into the mist the thought stole into my head that this could be the last chance I ever had to get those feelings…it could be the last night Vaan and I would be alive.

Up until that point I'd been scared before…but never really complentative. Something about entering the "City of the Gods" will do that to you I guess. Giruvagan - with all its twisting mist and strange creatures – we'd only got a glimpse of all that awaited us on the morning when we entered the city. With that unknown in front of me I suddenly had a flood of thoughts and feelings I had never considered before.

So when Bash touched my shoulder to take his watch, I knew. It was ending.

Wrapping my blanket tighter around my shoulders, I pushed to my feet and took the water jug Bash passed me. I took a long drink for courage, then handed it back.

Vaan and I shared a tent…it just seemed normal to us, so it wasn't hard to enter our tent. My courage started to falter when I stood in front of his sleeping form…half curled around my pillow. That made me smile; Vaan can't even sleep without stealing something. That returned my courage – I know Vaan.

So I plucked the pillow from his arms and instead curled my own body against him. He sighed and opened a sleepy eye. "Penny?" he mumbled, blinking owlishly at me.

I don't know what I had been intending to say, but what I did say was not it! "We might die tomorrow!" I blurted out, twisting to face him.

He shook his head to clear the cobwebs and smiled at me. "No we won't." he said.

"How can you know?"

"Because. We haven't saved Ashe's kingdom, or become sky pirates, or had kids or anything." He explained matter-o-factly.

I blinked. "Have kids?" I repeated idiotically.

Vaan smiled his angelic smile and pushed me back over on my side. He hitched his own body up behind me and wrapped his arm around my waist securely. "Go to sleep, Penny." He said. "It doesn't end tonight."

**Blackbird**

It's singing again tonight.

Since the war things have changed a lot. For one thing we now have a real house – we no longer are forced to subsist in a tiny dank apartment in Lowtown. We live in house only two houses away from the house I grew up in. That house no longer exists; it was torn down during the occupation to make way for an extension to some high ranking army officers house. It's sad to walk every day past the place where I once lived so happily, but it's a bittersweet sadness, because I now live here in this house…and I'm happy again.

The first night I woke in the darkness to the sound of the blackbird singing in our garden it made me cry. When I was little and had nightmares, my mother would hold me and sing to me, "Blackbird, sing…" Hearing that sweet sound only brought back the memories of my mother…and I cried.

It was a few minutes later, cradled in Vaan's arms, feeling his steady breath on my neck as he whispered nonsensical comfort into my hair that I realized – I'm happy. I don't cry myself to sleep at nights or wake up in a horrific nightmare. I lived through a crazy, fear-filled, dangerous time to come out of it and discover that things change for the worse sometimes - and sometimes – the better. So tonight as the blackbird sings, I'm not crying.

"Blackbird fly…"


	2. Chapter 2

_**AN: This one is Vaan's point of view. **_

_**Oh and I don't own FFXII or anything else particularly interesting except the cat…and she doesn't pay me anything. Sigh…**_

**Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds**

She's color and light and air and all the things that no one can contain. And when she dances – heck I'd jump off the Galbana in flight to see her dance. Not that it's much of a possibility I'll ever need to, but hey.

When we were little she followed me everywhere and annoyed me to death. Rekks always laughed and said someday I wouldn't mind so much; or maybe she would stop and I'd miss it. I never believed him.

Then after he died and Penelo became all I had – well, I started to understand what he meant. No one ever accuses me of brilliant understanding, but I'm not totally stupid either. I figured out that Penelo was something I didn't ever want to lose. When she was kidnapped…well I thought I'd died. I realized that maybe my plans, (the ones where Penelo and I were together forever, flying the skies, getting rich and perhaps raising some little sky pirates) well, maybe Penelo should be informed of them.

No, I didn't tell her the first second I saw her again…but we did discus my idea – in depth – (girls are crazy about details!) not long after we started that crazy adventure with Ashe. Fortunately she had some of the same ideas 'cause I'm not sure what I would have done otherwise.

So here we are on our own airship, flying across Ivalice just like I'd planned. And sitting here, watching her dance in the sunset, with the clouds flying around and her hair flying around and nothing around us but sky – I have to say – sometimes I don't get enough credit for my ideas.

This one was perfect.


End file.
